


i let my guard down (i kinda liked the way you numbed all the pain)

by TheYaoiChick



Series: Music Inspired [5]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aftermath, Break Up, Don't copy to another site, Episode: s3e11 The Day of Black Sun Part 2: The Eclipse, F/M, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-28
Updated: 2020-01-28
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:01:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22452337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheYaoiChick/pseuds/TheYaoiChick
Summary: She didn’t understand. She had thought they had finally settled. That now that he’d gotten all he wanted, seen what he needed to see, that his anger would fall away. That they could finally be happy. Anything but this.
Relationships: Mai/Zuko (Avatar)
Series: Music Inspired [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1481129
Kudos: 43





	i let my guard down (i kinda liked the way you numbed all the pain)

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration: Someone You Loved
> 
> [Sam Tsui and Casey Breves Cover Version](https://youtu.be/FJH8l7Mo8gA)

When she had first seen the letter, her heart had speed up - playing the exciting beat of a drum wondering what he had sent. Zuko had always been the romantic kind - product of all those plays he loves so much she figured - and had always thought that he would be the love letter type. She had figured it would be something over dramatic, but completely heart felt that while she’d never show it, would make her think about for days. Smile that special smile only he ever seemed to bring out in her, and read it more times than she would ever admit to while in the complete privacy of her own room.

To say that she was shocked to see what had actually been written would be an understatement. Because a letter? He breaks up with her over a **letter**? She would have thought _him_ of all people would understand the closer of at least saying goodbye in person, given the fact his mother didn’t even grant him and Azula that much, and he knows the scars that _that_ had left.

He could have at least looked her in the eye. She _deserved_ that much. Deserved to know what was so important, so urgent, that he leaves in the shadows without so much as a backward glance. She deserved to know if he felt _anything_ at leaving her behind, if he had actually loved her the way that she loves him.

And she had actually been letting her guard down! Been trying to be more open, more free with her emotions even though years of conditioning have left that so hard for her to do. All because he had asked. Because he liked knowing exactly where he stood, liked knowing when he was cared for. Apparently it was too much to ask for to get the same in return.

Stupid. How could she have been so _stupid?_

She should have known nothing that good last for long. Not when it comes to _their_ family. But she just had to get complacent, didn’t question him at all when he started saying that nonsense of no longer being himself instead of the person his father had wanted him to be. She was content in the thought that he would just let that be that, would lose the insistent need to please his father and become his own man. That his anger would start to cool now that he would stop placing unreachable standards on himself.

That for once in his life, he could be happy to just _be_. Be at peace, be a normal teenager even if he was a prince, with his normal girlfriend and they’d take whatever came at them together.

She had so foolishly thought she’d been _helping_ him to move on. To be there when he needed someone to listen, and when he needed someone to pull him out of his head and show the world wasn’t as completely bad and out to get him as he thought. Thought she was holding him together, like he was holding _her_ together.

Thought she’d been helping in the way he helped numb some of her pain. Though she knew she couldn't erase all of it - just like he could never erase all of hers - she thought she’d been at least making it bearable. How he helped for forget for awhile her fathers dismissal and mothers constant nagging and berating and feeling that no matter what she did, just being Mai wasn’t enough for them. That being just Mai _had_ been enough for **him**. Or at least... she had thought it was enough.

But this stupid, spirit cursed letter clearly showed otherwise.

He didn’t even ask if she would _come_. Had just made assumptions _for_ her, in ways that remind her far too much like her parents, like Azula even.

She silently weeps the rest of the night through. She should have never let her guard down. Because at least then, she wouldn't know how badly you can miss a person, no matter how much pain you’re in.

She wished she had never felt what it feels like to be loved.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos, comments and bookmarks make my day 💙


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